volumes is certainly in a sense valedictory, as it refers to the position acquired by the Champion, and the difficulty experienced in establishing it. Incidentally, it pays a high compliment to Pope, by speaking of “the divine Translation of the Iliad, which he [Fielding] has lately with no Disadvantage to the Translator COMPARED with the Original,” the point of the sentence so impressed by its typography, being apparently directed against those critics who had condemned Pope’s work without the requisite knowledge of Greek. From the tenor of the rest of the essay it may, however, be concluded that the writer was taking leave of his enterprise; and, according to a note by Boswell, in his Life of Johnson, it seems that Mr. Reed of Staple Inn possessed documents which showed that Fielding at this juncture, probably in anticipation of more lucrative legal duties, surrendered the reins to Ralph. The Champion continued to exist for some time longer; indeed, it must be regarded as long-lived among the essayists, since the issue which contained its well-known criticism on Garrick is No. 455, and appeared late in 1742. But as far as can be ascertained, it never again obtained the honours of a reprint.
Although, after he was called to the Bar, Fielding practically relinquished periodical literature, he does not seem to have entirely desisted from writing. In Sylvanus Urban’s Register of Books, published during January 1741, is advertised the poem Of True Greatness afterwards included in the Miscellanies; and the same authority announces the Vernoniad, an anonymous burlesque Epic prompted by Admiral Vernon’s popular expedition against Porto Bello in 1739, “with six Ships
